Every Christmas I remember a ticking-off from my late mother-in-law, an observant Roman Catholic, after I'd jeered at some celebrity for being as thick as brandy butter. Well, I can't pretend that I've always abided by my mother-in-law's stricture in newspaper columns I've written over the years. But bearing her lesson in mind, and in the spirit of Christmas peace …
How would it feel to wake up from a coma, convinced that the year is 1980, only to be told that it is actually 2019 – and you have no memory of anything that has happened over the past four decades? Luciano D’Adamo was knocked unconscious by a hit-and-run driver five years ago and when he came to an hour …
When my scholarly journalist grandfather died in 1974, my grandmother determined to get rid of his enormous library. But then nor, for that matter, could I willingly get rid of most of the other belongings I've accumulated over the years: old favourite sweaters, now so moth-eaten as to be unwearable; two semi-functioning steam irons, only slightly leaky ; an electric …
